


The World Has Somehow Shifted

by apanoplyofsong



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Future Fic, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-21
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-10-22 02:21:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10687800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apanoplyofsong/pseuds/apanoplyofsong
Summary: The end of the world is quicker than she expected.“You don’t have to be on guard every minute, you know,” she says, and Bellamy's eyes flicker up to her, his lips tilting at the edges.“Somebody’s gotta do it.”





	The World Has Somehow Shifted

**Author's Note:**

> Oh hey, remember me? It's been a while. Life and such.  
> This is a future fic but I haven't looked at any spoilers for the end of s4, so if you're avoiding those, you're safe here. It's also a little loose on the actual canon we've already seen, tbh.
> 
> Anyway, the title here is from Tangled, because this was originally inspired by that scene. You know the one.

The end of the world doesn’t come like she expected.

There is no bang, no whimper--just three long beeps from the Geiger counter hooked up to the air outside their bunker, a mundane signal for the wave of radiation destined to wipe out their humanity.

Even before the doors closed, it already had.

Monty sits in the corner, face drawn and blank as he stares at the wall ahead of him. Jasper’s still outside the confines of their safehouse, and no one’s tried to touch him since the locks closed. Octavia’s pacing and anxious, Bellamy’s back turned to her like it pains him, but the only thing their childhood left stronger in Octavia than her defiance was her determination to survive.

All the lights in the main room glow low. People sit slumped against the walls and each other, some sleeping and some shaking, so many haunted by this place where past and future meet.

There’s not much left to do now but wait.

Clarke wonders if that’s really what it means to survive.

 

* * *

 

The end of the world is quicker than she expected, too.

After two years, they load a boat and head upriver. The sun feels hotter than Clarke remembers but they confirmed, again and again before they ever broached the topic of opening the doors, that radiation levels had dropped to a point where their bodies could handle it with the help of a nightblood dilution Abby developed.

There’s a valley sheltered by mountains that they think survived the worst of the wave.They may get to call it home. Luna has assured them the soil’s good, rich from the spring floods every year, and if anything’s survived, it should be easy to make life grow there. Everyone is restless in their freedom, packing the deck to watch the shoots of new foliage pass by until the sun sets in a fierce haze.

When the night comes, everything quiets. Clarke unrolls her pallet below deck alongside the others, does her best to doze until the silence wakes her again.

She walks the length of the boat, letting the stillness of the dark wash over her. It’s changed in their time underground. The engine gives a low hum as it pushes upstream, but the buzz of insects she was used to, the crackle of fire and low murmur of human activity she knew even in the bunker are missing.

The air has cooled slightly by the time she’s reached the bow of the boat. Bellamy’s leaning against the wall of the cabin, fingers wrapped around his gun, and she stops, watches for a moment as the moonlight falls across his face.

“You don’t have to be on guard every minute, you know,” she says, and his eyes flicker up to her, his lips tilting at the edges.

“Somebody’s gotta do it.”

“That’s what we have rotations for. And I know for a fact that yours ended hours ago.” Clarke pokes a finger into his side as she slides down the wall next to him, tucks her legs against her chest. He sits down a moment later, his side pressed warm and firm against hers. She’s glad the night help hides her smile.

This has changed, too. The easiness with which they press close to each other; the way Bellamy settles his shoulder behind hers so that their arms are linked down to the elbow. The soft look in his eyes that he stopped trying to hide sometime after their eighth month underground.

He lets the gun rest in his lap. “Yeah, well. You know I’ve never been good at letting other people help.”

The levity with which they can speak to their own flaws, small and large--that’s new, as well. Clarke shifts her weight so that she nudges his side, voice gentle in the quiet when she speaks.

“Harper’s got this. Miller and Jac and Karen, too. They’re all at their posts. We’re good, Bellamy.” She searches out his eyes in the flickering lamplight. “We’re safe.”

The breath leaves his body in a rush and he tucks his head into her shoulder. It makes the part of her heart that’s still tender, still soft with the very ache of him, beat solidly through her bones, warming her with a flush that spreads all the way through her toes.

His hand plays idly with the loose threads on the edge of her knee and she catches it, tucks her fingers around his. Lets her eyes close, just for a moment. They sit in silence, the rock of the current rolling through their bodies and into each other.

“Clarke,” Bellamy breathes at one point and she hums, breathing in the smell of his hair. He squeezes her hand, jostles her slightly. “Clarke, look.”

When she opens her eyes, they’re surrounded by pinpricks of light. It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust, for her brain to process what she’s seeing, but when it does she leans forward, a smile wide across her face. When she looks over, she can see Bellamy is doing the same.

Between them, dozens of small insects bob and fly, swarming in a wave of soft green phosphorescence. She’s never seen these before but she remembers fields lit up when they first came to Earth, remembers seeing something similar in films on the Ark.

“Fireflies.”

Bellamy nudges one back into flight from where it’s crashed into the floor. “If insects were the first to disappear before the radiation, is it a good sign that they’re back?” He looks serious again, brow furrowed, and she knocks her knee against his.

“I think we’re overdue for a good sign.” Clarke grins and he smiles back. The insects buzz in a halo around his head.

It’s been building for a while, she knows, this thing between them. She can feel it swirling now as he watches her watch the space between them, his eyes reflecting the glowing forms like starlight. Bellamy is her favorite person--has been, since before they closed the bunker doors--but the world is volatile and they so weak and she never wanted to walk into something with Bellamy without carrying hope.

But now, the heat of him sinks into her skin where he’s pressed against her side and she thinks that this, maybe, was worth all that surviving.

He reaches out to brush her cheek, careful and gentle, and her breath catches in her lungs. When he pulls his hand back there’s a single insect on it, wings almost white against the dark, seemingly content to settle against the curve of his finger for a moment. Clarke holds her hand alongside his and it crawls across before flying away.

Bellamy is watching her when she looks up. The swarm moves along the river, leaving the air strangely still again in its wake. The world feels heavy and light and she wants nothing more than to burrow into his chest, curl up until the morning with his heart beating beneath her ear.

“Clarke, I…”

His eyes flicker over her, brow furrowed slightly. His mouth stays parted like the words are just on the edge of falling out. Bellamy’s gaze catches on her lips for a moment and her heart aches at the open adoration on his face.

It’s easy, leaning forward. It’s easy to cup his cheek, brush a curl from his forehead, to watch the softness move through his eyes.

He meets her halfway, the press of his mouth warm and sweet against her lips, their breath mingling in the space between when he tilts her chin and moves in again. It’s easy to get lost in the feel of him under her hands and mouth, in the soft touch of their tongues together; and it’s easy, after they’ve pulled apart, to guess what he’s trying to say when he shifts slightly where her forehead is still resting against his.

After all, it’s just them. It’s always easy to be sure, with him.

"I know," Clarke says. She loves him, too. But this moment--she doesn't need to break it, doesn't need to make it anything other than what it already is. "You can tell me tomorrow."

Bellamy shuffles and pulls her in with his arm wrapped around her, weaving the fingers of his other hand with hers so that they rest together on his leg. She tucks her face against his chest.

“Yeah. Tomorrow.”

It’s quiet for a moment, just the sound of their breathing and the engine’s soft turn. The sky is still dark but the moon is moving closer to the horizon, time marching on towards a day she used to not be sure they had.

“Bellamy?”

“Yeah?”

Clarke squeezes his hand. “Go to sleep.”

He huffs a laugh and presses a kiss to her head before resting his own atop hers, leaning back so they rest against the cabin wall. “You should get some sleep, too.”

She listens for the start of his breaths evening out, presses closer to his side. “I will,” she says, and lets her eyes slip closed.

Braced against one another, they do.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to send me inspiration to help avoid another 4 month gap between posts, come hang out at apanoplyoffic.tumblr.com.


End file.
